Published September 14, 2018

Introduction & Welcome

Welcome to CTSInsider, the newsletter of the Clinical & Translational Science Institute of Southeast Wisconsin! In this issue you will find news and announcements, including upcoming opportunities and events, and research trainings, as well as an overview of services available to support you. Happy reading!

CTSI & You

CTSI is here to serve you! We offer a variety of resources and services to augment the myriad of research infrastructure options available to research teams across CTSI partner institutions. CTSI offers more than 20 different services and resources all aimed at supporting you and your clinical and translational research. These include recruitment and study support services offered through our Clinical Trials Office and Adult Translational Research Unit, Biomedical Informatics consulting services, Biostatistical consults and mini-grants, research process improvement consults, and research funding available through our Pilot Translational & Clinical Studies program. Visit the CTSI website for more information.

About CTSI

CTSI Science Cafés—Addressing Health Disparities in Underrepresented Minority/Underserved Communities

 Our Science Cafés are designed to reach out to the community and engage community members in all aspects of translational research. These events also promote dissemination of research results from local faculty of MCW or the CTSI partners/collaborators. This creates a unique setting for researchers to share their results with the community and provides an opportunity for the community to discuss the research with the scientists firsthand. Topics for all presentations are generated from the community. Since 2017, we formed a new collaborative partnership with St. Ann Center for Intergenerational Care, where Science Cafés were offered monthly. St. Ann Center is a $21 million, 80,000 square-foot facility in one of the most underserved neighborhoods in Milwaukee that brings child and adult day care services to the community. Ten Science Cafés were held from January to October 2017, on topics based on the recommendation of community members, on topics such as hypertension, diabetes, stroke rehabilitation, and the opioid epidemic. More than 268 people attending the Science Cafés in 2017.

In 2018, we have successfully collaborated with faith-based communities/churches throughout the local area. Thus far, 3 Science Cafés were held at underrepresented minority churches in the community, and several have already been planned throughout 2018. In addition, a Science Café addressing the Autism Spectrum Disorder was held at the Betty Brinn Children’s Museum on January 30, 2018. Two additional Science Cafés were held for the CTSI 500 Stars Initiative students and their parents in July and August, 2018. See the CTSI website for more details.

CTSI 500 Stars Summer Internship Program

On August 3, 2018 the CTSI held its closing ceremony and poster presentation for the CTSI 500 Stars Summer Internship Program. In attendance were family, friends, preceptors, and students alike. Congratulations to our 107 Stars for completing this year’s Summer Internship Program.

The CTSI 500 Stars Summer Internship Program seeks to increase the diversity of the translational science workforce. Our Vision is to enrich the southeast Wisconsin translational research workforce through promoting inclusion and diversity. Our Mission is to provide training and educational opportunities to diversity students in high school, undergraduate, and graduate programs who are looking for a career in clinical and translational science.

The CTSI 500 Stars Summer Internship Program offers direct, hands-on professional experiences in clinical and translational science settings, as well as providing additional educational and professional development through films, lectures, seminars, and other group sessions at the Medical College of Wisconsin.

News & Announcements For You

Dean’s Award 2018

The Dean’s Award in Clinical & Translational Research was created to recognize MCW faculty and staff who have made a significant contribution to advancing translational science to improve the health of our patients. Five nominations were submitted at the close of August 31^st and a selections committee meeting was held on September 6^th to decide on the awardees. Congratulations to Piero Antuono, MD and Shi-Jiang Li, PhD! The Award will be presented at the MCW Convocation Ceremony on September 24, 2018.

CTSI & Office of Community Engagement Fund Community-Engaged Seed Grant

Merle Orr, MD, Assistant Professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation, and his community partner, Shalina Ali, Co-executive Director of TRUE Skool, have received funding for their proposal, “Developing a culturally adapted intervention to increase physical activity among young African-American men with spinal cord injury due to gun violence: A pilot study.”

The MCW Office of the Senior Associate Dean for Community Engagement and the Clinical and Translational Science Institute of Southeast Wisconsin are jointly supporting this $50,000 seed grant award through their respective parent awards from the Advancing a Healthier Wisconsin Research and Education Program, a component of the Advancing a Healthier Wisconsin Endowment at MCW.

With a focus on survivorship of gun violence, this project will engage young, African-American men who have a spinal cord injury due to gun violence with community partners and clinicians to increase physical activity to improve functional independence, quality of life, and healthy behaviors. Prior initiatives have primarily focused on reducing homicides due to gun violence; however, few have focused on the recovery and community reintegration of survivors of gun violence. This project seeks to implement a culturally-anchored model and approach, with academic medicine partnering with community organizations that function in the cultural context of this population. If successful, this model will fill a gap in resources to support the health and wellness in this population and may be applied both within the city of Milwaukee and in other urban settings.

This project represents promising translational research in the areas of health disparities and recruitment strategies for community participation in research, with a focus on the Milwaukee area. It also seeks to advance understanding of how community engagement can be conducted in complex research settings, including through sustainable and authentic community-academic partnerships. In addition, the funded project demonstrates clear relevance and importance to the work Dr. Orr does on campus and, more importantly, to the community members involved in the project.

National News and Announcements

Research Match

Research Match (RM) is an online tool bringing together researchers with volunteers trying to find research studies and clinical trials. Volunteers sign-up online with RM and then watch for e-mails informing them of potential research studies. If the volunteer is interested, the study team is notified and they can establish direct contact with them.  RM is preparing to launch a Spanish version of the website. The tool will help Researchers at participating institutions to connect with and recruit Spanish-speaking volunteers into studies and allow Spanish-speaking volunteers to identify and sign-up for studies. The RM team is actively working with a Spanish Advisory Panel to ensure the translated content is accurate, culturally sensitive, and clear. Spanish RM aims to launch in summer 2018.

A researcher can use RM in two ways:

Feasibility access allows a researcher to search for the total number of volunteers who might meet the inclusion criteria for a study.

Recruitment access allows one to search and contact volunteers after submitting evidence of IRB approval.

The top 5 conditions reported among the local cohort include:
Research Match is particularly useful for matching healthy volunteers and persons with rare diseases to suitable studies. Nationally there are 131,517 volunteers in RM. Currently, there are 812 volunteers who are 50 miles or closer to the Medical College of Wisconsin. Demographic information includes:

The top 5 conditions reported among the local cohort include:

• No condition 26%
• Depression 13%
• Anxiety 10%
• High Blood Pressure 9%
• Asthma 7%

Research Match is a free service offered by the MCW CTO. If you are interested in learning more, please visit Research Match at the CTO website.

NIH Releases Strategic Plan for Data Science

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) released its first ever Strategic Plan for Data Science to capitalize on the opportunities presented by advances in data science.  The plan describes NIH’s overarching goals, strategic objectives, and implementation tactics for promoting the modernization of the NIH-funded biomedical data science ecosystem.

Over the course of the next year, NIH will begin implementing its strategy, with some elements of the plan already underway. NIH will continue to seek community input during the implementation phase.

New Funding Opportunities Available for Collaborative Rare Diseases Research

 NCATS announced two new Rare Diseases Clinical Research Network (RDCRN) program funding opportunities to support collaborative clinical research on rare diseases. The Center is accepting applications for Rare Diseases Clinical Research Consortia and a Data Management and Coordinating Center (DMCC); both funding opportunities have a deadline of October 9, 2018.

The RDCRN is intended to advance the diagnosis, management and treatment of rare diseases with a focus on clinical trial readiness. Each consortium will promote highly collaborative, multi-site, patient-centric, translational and clinical research with the intent of addressing unmet clinical trial readiness needs.

The DMCC manages the collection, storage and quality control of clinical research data for the network. The RDCRN will emphasize data standards, which will facilitate data sharing among its members and others outside the network also studying rare diseases. NCATS will provide “cloud” computing services through the DMCC, enabling greater data accessibility and use. The DMCC will provide expertise and consulting to research consortia in several areas, such as the development and management of research study protocols, biostatistics, and study design. Learn more.

New Funding Opportunities to Support the Development of Medications to Prevent and Treat Opioid Use Disorders and Overdose (UG3/UH3)

The purpose of this Funding Opportunity Announcement is to support the discovery and development of medications to prevent and treat opioid use disorders (OUD) and overdose.

Under the Help to End Addiction Long-term (HEAL) Initiative, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) has been allocated funds to support medications development to prevent and treat opioid use disorders and overdose. NIDA is currently accepting grant applications for up to $3 million dollars per year (or more with prior NIDA approval) for up to five years under the RFA DA-19-002. This RFA is designed to review and fund grant application in an expedited fashion with a rolling acceptance of applications and expedited review by NIDA Council. Learn more.

CTSI At Your Service: Highlights

CTSI offers more than 20 different services and resources all aimed at supporting you and your clinical and translational research.

Town Hall Meetings: A-TRU Data Report and Strategic Update

The CTSI of Southeast Wisconsin has initiated the process of restructuring the Adult Translational Research Unit (A-TRU) to robustly support our investigator needs. In our efforts to better understand these needs, we have conducted three town hall meetings (February through March 2018) and sent out surveys to local partners, collecting exhaustive data and feedback. In addition, we have reached out to other CTSA sites across the country and engaged in comparative analysis of costs, services and overall operations.

The purpose of the following three A-TRU Town Hall Meetings are to disseminate the findings of the above mentioned activities to the CTSI research community and lay groundwork and strategic vision for the TRU and its role at the CTSI Hub. Learn more.

Carl Greer

CTSI 500 Star

Investigator’s Corner: You & CTSI Advancing Research & Discovery

Each newsletter we will highlight researchers, scholars, and students engaging in research across the CTSI.

Carl Greer participated in CTSI’s 500 Stars Initiative, a ten-year, comprehensive, multi-institutional, and community-focused, education and workforce diversity plan, with the overarching objective of replenishing, while increasing diversity in the translational science workforce. Carl shared his experiences from participating in our 500 Stars Summer Internship program.

CTSI 500 Star Carl Greer

My time spent as a CTSI Scholar has been highly beneficial in my development as a researcher and more importantly as a person. During my first cycle in CTSI, I conducted research in the ophthalmology field. This was outside my traditional focus in research and helped to increase my capacity when working with unfamiliar disciplines. The connections I fostered from CTSI helped me to secure an internship in the Office of Diversity and Inclusion (ODI). I believe that the ODI has given me the proper tools in assisting marginalized populations, while also helping me increase my community praxis with various groups of people. All of the aforementioned skills are necessary as I continue my academic career. I will be attending the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor on fellowship as I complete a dual masters in Educational Leadership and Policy and Social Work. The opportunities to better the world around me are limitless. I am grateful for the role CTSI played in cultivating the tools and relationships I’ve acquired. This experience has been priceless.

Lubna N. Chaudhary

MD, MS

Aaron Winn

Phd

The CTSI congratulates Lubna N. Chaudhary MD, MS and Aaron Winn PhD for being named as recipients of 2018 Mentored Career Development Awards. These awards provide training opportunities for junior faculty working in clinical and translational research to become independent investigators, and are funded by the Advancing a Healthier Wisconsin Research and Education Program.

2018 Mentored Career Development Award recipients Lubna N. Chaudhary and Aaron Winn

Dr. Chaudhary is Assistant Professor of Medicine in the division of Hematology & Oncology at Medical College of Wisconsin. She received her medical training from King Edward Medical College, Pakistan and completed her Internal Medicine residency at West Virginia University, then completed her Hematology/Oncology fellowship at Medical College of Wisconsin in 2015. Additionally, she completed a Master’s degree in Clinical and Translational Science through CTSI at MCW. With a primary research interest in better understanding the biology of breast cancer tumors, resistance mechanisms and impact on patient outcomes, Dr. Chaudhary is working to identify new drug therapies to overcome cancer cell growth. Her investigator initiated clinical trial assessing neoadjuvant endocrine therapy and tumor molecular changes in patients with breast cancer was the recipient of funding from the Rock River Cancer Research Foundation and the MCW Cancer Center in 2017.

Dr. Winn received his PhD from the Gilling School of Public Health in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in summer of 2017. Aaron’s research interests lie at the intersection of data science, causal inference and population health. He applies novel analytic techniques to determine the comparative effectiveness of treatments as well as identify drivers of disparities. He has published over 30 articles and his works has been cited in the Washington Post, the New York Times and Forbes.

Please join us in congratulating both Dr. Chaudhary and Dr. Winn!

Andrea Moosreiner

MPH, RD, CD

CTSI Staff & Faculty: At Work for You

Each newsletter we will highlight staff and faculty working to support you and your research.

Andrea Moosreiner has been a registered dietitian with the CTSI Adult Translational Research Unit for the past 8 years. She holds a graduate degree from the Medical College of Wisconsin in Public Health and understands that eating right is different for everyone. Her nutrition knowledge is rooted in science, however, she maintains a realistic approach to eating healthy.

CTSI is grateful to Andrea for her exemplary participation in our Science Café Community Engagement efforts.  Andrea presented “Understanding Food & Nutrition Labels” at the Science Café at St. Ann Center for Intergenerational Care in October.  She did such an excellent job engaging with the audience, that Tabernacle Community Baptist Church’s Health and Wellness ministry invited us to bring her to their congregation on Saturday, February 3, where Andrea made her presentation to another 41 persons, including the Health Minister from Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church who invited her to present again at their Salad Fest on Sunday, May 6. Tabernacle also scheduled Andrea to return for an additional two presentations “Healthy Eating for People on the Go” on June 2, and “Healthy Food Choices During the Holiday Season” to help them meet their congregational goal of losing 1000 lbs. this year.  So far through the Science Café, Andrea has reached 140 people with her messages, tips, and information to help them make better food choices for healthier living.